Twenty-four hours of solid, stair-rod Cornish rain had given way to an
afternoon of patchy, wind-streaked blue sky. At Gweek, where the winding
Helford River pushes its blunt finger-ends against the land, the houses lay
quiet along the quay. Houseboats both ramshackle and trim, ebb-fast yachts,
ancient storm-decked trawlers and families of ducks shared the mud
companionably with mournfully piping oystercatchers.

On Naphene Downs, above the village, wind seethed in over the oak woods and
battered the hedges of the bridleway that Jane and